I don't have a feature poet this week, just me and my library compadres.

But I do have new work by photographer Thomas Costales. Thomas is a night person, wandering the city at night taking photos, showing us how things so ordinary in the light become new and mysterious at night. I like his photos very much, both his night scenes and his portraits, featured here before. I like his stuff so much I have asked him to let me use the photo above for the cover of my next book, tentatively titled, "goes around - comes around," which I hope to have out in several months. Something about this photo leads me to think, every time I look at it, about what strange things might be lurking just around the corner of the building. Mystery, I love it.

A funny thing this week - checking out my listing on Amazon I discovered that both the new book on Kindle and my first book (a paperback) is available there, something like eight new copies, four used and one labeled, "collectible", priced a few cents more than the new because, apparently, it is signed.

Two things occur to me. First, this must make me a collector of collectibles, since about twenty percent of the several hundred poetry books I've bought at the secondhand store are signed. Perhaps I should buy insurance.

The other thing that comes to me is, I have a closet full of unsold books. I think maybe I should start signing them and salting the market with them.

Probably have to be dead, though, to make it really pay off.

As I consider my options, I present to you our line-up for the week.

Jeannette LozanoThe HouseFall the Wounded LeavesImage of a Canvas of Winter

Mea lousy miserable nasty ugly morning

Bogdan CzaykowskiLike a Child

Sheryl St. GermainPromise of Snow

Meso horny the crack of dawn ain’t safe

Sylvia PlathArielPoppies in October

Mea good way to start is all I’m saying

Pamela KircherWe Love the Moon So It Shines

Menaked rolling, parts rubbing

AiMore

MeObama-lover

Alberto RiosTeodoro Luna’s Two KissesTeodoro Luna’s Old Joke

Meon the death of a patron and friendjust like you and mesix white-haired men

April BernardPsalm of the SleepingPsalm of the Disarranged

Methe NRA is ascared of me

Debbie KirkI Had the Best Aim in Kindergarten

Iris BerryOde to Sammy Glick

Cynthia Ruth LewisThe Makings of a Serial Killer

Misti Rainwater-LitesFirst Time

Jude LynnAll the World Wants Anal

Melast week

raulrsalinasTree of Life Vision

Meanother Sunday Morninga is for applecock-a-doodle

Photo by Thomas Costales

My first poems this week are by Jeannette Lozano, from her book The Movements of Water/Los momentos del agua. It's a beautiful, hard-bound bilingual book, published in 2006 by Ediciones Poligrafa of Barcelona, Spain. Spanish to English translation is by Rod Hudson.

The book includes beautiful paintings by Victor Ramirez.

In addition to being a poet and translator, Lozano has spent many years teaching and writing about the ancient philosophy and religion of Pre-Hispanic cultures.

Her work, including her own work and translations, ii extensive, as are her honors and rewards. Her poetry collections have been published in English, French, Italian and Romanian.

The House

The house, that uncertain place: The girl-childwithout a lamp, whitethe beginning, the revelationburns in silence.All beginning is white,the compositionof the form, silentthe fog, the tree. The girl-childsilent,the height, theair. All beginningis white, the unfor5seen disaster. The silentfog, whosemusic is silence, dispersedsyllables.

Fall the Wounded Leaves

IDead shadowthe heartsubmerging itself with the first sign.

IIAs if they bring the dead,barges dissolve. I recall them in the (transparent)handsthat (still) seek themselves

IIIBrilliance on ruinsin the landscape of white stones.Deathbefore vacuous altars.The spilled absence, the footsteps in the fogor forestthat we come to be

“Condensed water vaporin cloud-like masseslying close to the groundand limiting visibility.”

that kind…

and the mist,well,the thing about mistis, while wet,it isn’t rain, doesn’tsound like rain falling,no plopsno dropsjust silent inundationdriftingwith every light breeze;doesn’t smell like rain;doesn’t taste like rain;doesn’t do anything like rainbut get you wet, which isthe least enjoyablethingabout rain,unless you happen to be runningnakedacross a softfield of fresh grasswith a honey-haired meadow goddessrunningrightalong side you,splashy-splashysexalmost guaranteed -

mist doesn’t promiseany of that,onlywet and day-dreamshrivelingcold…

that’s mainly whyit’s aa lousymiserablenastyugly morning…

I could ‘a done betterstaying inbed

Photo by Thomas Costales

Next, I have two poets from the Winter/Spring 2007 issue of The Spoon River Poetry Review, published by the Spoon River Poetry Association with funding from the Illinois Arts Council.

The first poet is Bogdan Czaykowski, a Polish Canadian poet essayist, literary translator and critic born in 1932 in Poland. He was professor emeritus and former Dean at the University of British Columbia at the time of his death in 2007.

His poem was translated by Adam Czeniawski.

Like a Child

Like a child,Which in dread curiosityTightly grips his old nanny's sleeveAnd pulls her to the wood,So do I lead myselfDipping my feetIn fathomless waters of a silent stream,Whose banks rustle in the darkest depthsWith leafy shadows that have shed their shade.

Sheryl St. Germain, born 1954 in New Orleans, Louisiana, is a poet, essayist, and professor.

Of Cajun and Creole descent, she was born and raised in south Louisiana. Currently she directs the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Program at Chatham University in Pittsburgh. She has also taught at the University of Louisiana, Lafayette, 1991-94; Knox College, 1994-98; and Iowa State University, 1998-2005.

She studied at Southeastern Louisiana University (B.A.) and University of Texas at Dallas, (M.A. and Ph.D.).

Promise of Snow

Thanksgiving break, and the city quiets,seems half-full. Most have gone somewhereelse for the holidays. The cornfieldsare empty, too, cleaned of corn,and I've cleaned up too. The mirrorshattered when he threw my sonagainst it, and I've swept up the arrowheadsof glass, the ice picks, the toothpicks,the thorns of glass, slivers so smallyou don't notice them until they're inside you.I've righted the furniture too,and scrubbed the floor of kitchen and living room,the smudges like blurred roses on the doorwaywhere he rested, like God before the seventh day,and even the ragged pool of it on the bed.I soaked and washed and bleached the sheets,and all is white now, clean like the new snow,what the weatherman promises for nest week,and sometimes I think that's why I live here:because of snow, and the way it whitens and coverseverything: you don't even have to scrub. Sliversand their sinister knowledge are buried under its crust.You can believe, for a time, in emptiness,holiday.

Photo by Thomas Costales

I've been writing mostly crap this week and, worst of all, having no fun at it at all. So here's a poem from last year; one of the ones I'm considering for my previously mentioned next book.

so horny the crack of dawn ain't safe

that’s a linefrom a book i’m reading,demonstrationof the benefit that accrues to those of us who avoid high-class literature

cause, for sure,you won’t find that linein Shelley or Keats,nor in Longfellow, Tennyson, or Donne -

Twain, maybebut only in one of those bookshe wouldn’t publishuntil after his death or 1962,which ever came first -

Shakespeare,probably - imagine the lineas read by Olivier or Burton -if he had thought of itand if he would read it now,he’d probably say, darn, why didn’t i think of that -

and the ancient roman poets,for sure - those guys were alwayshornied-up in their baths - we justhaven’t dug the lines out of the ruins yet -

and Li Po, certainly,if he’d looked up from the bubblesof his beer long enough to think of it,in fact there’s a rumor, that he did,the night he drowned after toasting the reflection of the moonin the lake, he just never had a chanceto write it down

~~

I never had time for the classics, spentmy reading time with piratesand sword fights and cannon ballsblowing off heads,and cowboys and gunslingers,fast-draws at high noon,and space adventures in far-awaygalaxies and shapely green women from the planet Holy Cow!!,and hard-boiled dicksand their molls built like...well, built pretty darn good

and lets face it, i read Silas Marner and Tess of the d'Rubbervillesand all that andthey were pretty good, butnot nearly as much fun as blond-hairedmolls built like...well, you know

because, as everyone knowsI’ve been fifteen years old since the year i was fifteen years oldand have no desire, all these years later,to turn sixteen and get serious

Photo by Thomas Costales

Here are two poems by Sylvia Plath, from her book Ariel.

I bought the book at my secondhand book store for 98 cents, much less than I would have expected, considering the poet. Maybe the price was low because it is old, the last published edition in 1965 by Harper & Row. But then I notice the original price was just $2.25.

Ariel

Stasis in darkness.Then the substanceless bluePour of tor and distances.

God's lioness,How one we grow,Pivot of heels and knees! - The furrow

Splits and passes, sister toThe brown areOf the neck I cannot catch,

Nigger-eyeBerries cast darkHooks -

Black sweet blood mouthfuls,Shadows.Something else

Hauls me through air -Thighs, hair;Flakes from my heels.

WhiteGodiva, I unpeel -Dead hands,dead stringencies.

And now IFoam to wheat, a glitter of seas,The child's cry

Melts in the wall.And I Am the arrow,

The dew that fliesSuicidal, at one with the driveInto the red

Eye, the cauldron of morning.

Poppies in October

Even the sun-clouds this morning cannot manage such skirts.Nor the woman in the ambulanceWhose red heart blooms through her coat so astoundingly -

A gift, a love giftUtterly unasked forBy a sky

Palely and flamilyIgniting its carbon monoxides, by eyesDulled to a halt under bowlers.

O my God, what am IThat these late mouths should cry openIn a forest of frost, in a dawn of cornflowers

Photo by Thomas Costales

I was having a lot of fun late last year. Here's another poem from then, another candidate for the next book.

a good way to start is all I’m saying

it’s chillthat’s what I’m saying -

went out to feed the crittersand froze my jelly-belly

nearfa-telly

but the sun’sarising

like an old man’s hoosit

when memories strikewith tentpole-city

dreams of that pretty girlfrom 1954 all bobby-

socked and whooshy skirtedrising all the way to her holymoses

when she twirled

to the beatof her rocker-roll feet

like Hermione Gingoldpeddling her pettifogs

through the roses of theSangre de Chevalier…

butI was saying

it’s a chill-bill daybut the sun’s arising

an all-together encouraging way

I’m saying to kick-off the day

Photo by Thomas Costales

Now I have a poem by Pamela Kircher, from her book, Whole Sky, published by Four Way Books in 1996.

Kirchner holds a Bachelor's Degree from Ohio University, a Master of Library Science from Kent State University and a Master of Fine Arts from Warren Wilson College's MFA Program for Writers. I couldn't Google up any more biographical information, but I did find a new poem she published in September, last year.

We Love the Moon So It Shines

There are things seen onlywhen the lights are off.Like night shifting its ashesthrough the house almost soundlesslyexcept for a sudden crack then latera soft thud for all the worldlike a shovel breaking a root and a clump of dirtdropped into a hole. Being buried alive.How simple. She touches the floorwith one foot, the edge of the bedwith on hand. There she isin the mirror, hardly a woman at all:crooked at the waist,one arm long,one bent. She picks up her dressfrom the floor and lays it over the manin the bed. Let him wakein the hours that come and findwhat his lies have done. The bodyof the blue dress as emptyas the lover she has become.All the rest of her ugly and dumbas the moon's far face waiting nightafter night to turn to the earthand shine.

Photo by Thomas Costales

Here's another poem I wrote last year during a time when I woke up every morning looking forward to the poem I was going to write that day.

It is also a candidate for the next book.

naked rolling, parts rubbing

a slow Sundayafternoonand we were trying to decide what to do

and I suggested we getnakedand roll around on the grassin the backyard,rubbingbody parts togetherfiercely

but there’s a bit of a chillin the air, probably to much chillto be rolling around outsidenakedno matter how fiercely werubbed together

so I was thinkingwell we could go down to the art museumand take a look at the impressionistexhibition,settle down nakedin front of the Monetand give him an impression -rolling aroundon the carpet rubbingbody parts togetherimpressionistically -that might make the old guy forgetall about water lilies...

but they have these guardsdown there,that follow us around from room to roomand I don’t know whyexcept maybe they can read mindsand don’t abide withpeople rubbing naked partstogetherin front of the Monet -

maybeif we moved overin front of the Duchamp,he did a lot of his ownnaked parts-rubbing, as I understand it, and what’s that nude going to do afterdescending the staircasebut some parts-rubbing, causewhy else go downstairsnaked as a jaybirdif there weren’t some parts-rubbingintentions…

but the guardsare so guardedly attentivethe museum is outand I was thinking we might take a drivein the hill country - the way the leaves are changingin our backyard, there must be pilesof red and orange and yellow and goldleaves laying on the groundunder some of those big hill countryoak trees, ripe for some good old rustic naked parts-rubbing rolling around, but it is evencolder in the hills than it is hereso there’s the chill factor to consider,plus all those rattlesnakes who love to hid in leaf pileson these chilly days, or maybe up in the trees - they do like to climboak trees to sleep through the winter -and I think they might not welcomepeople waking them up, rolling aroundnaked in the leaves, rubbing partstogether with sylvan abandon, despitethe fact it was a snake in a treethat started all this naked rolling aboutand parts-rubbing in the first place…

or, we might just do what we alwaysdoon lazy Sunday afternoons, could just take a Sunday afternoonnapyou in the easy chairand me on the couch

just like we alwaysdo

Photo by Thomas Costales

Next I have a poem by Ai, from her book, Vice. The book was published by W.W. Norton in 1999.

The poet, winner of the National Book Award for Poetry in 1999 for this book, also the Lamont Poetry Award from the Academy of American Poets in 1978 for Killing Floor and the American Book Award in 1987 for Sin.

Ai, born Florence Anthony in 1947, died last year.

More

for James Wright

Last night, I dreamed of America.It was prom night.She lay down under the spinning globesat the makeshift bandstandin her worn-out dressand too-high heels,the gardeniapinned at her waistwas brown and crumbling into itself.What'[s it worth, she cried,This land of Pilgrims' pride?As much as love, I answered. More.The globes spun.I never won anything, I said,I lost time and lovers, years,but you, purple mountains,you amber waves of grain, belong to meas much as I do to you.She sighed,the band played,the skin fell from her bones.The the room went blackand I woke.I want my life back,the days of too much clarity,the nights smelling of rage,but it's gone.If I could shift my bodythat is too weak now,I'd lie face down on this hospital bed,this icy water called Ohio River.I'd float past all the sad towns,past all the dreamers onshorewith their hands out.I'd hold on. I'd hold,till the weight,till the awful heavinesstore from me,sank to the bottom and stayed.Then I'd stand uplike Lazarusand walk home across the water.

Photo by Thomas Costales

Working with old stuff today, I ran across this piece written in 2009. I found it a timely reminder, that, despite the far-right whiners, losers, and ne'er-do-wells who aspire turn our country into a right-wing version of East Germany, there is still reason to be hopeful.

Obama-lover

i’m hearingfrom the right-wing circlejerks that people like mewho are not at all like themare Obama-worshipers,if not Obama-lovers, a milderversion of an epithet heard on occasionfrom right-wing racistswhere i grew up when i grew up

forcing me to write a political poem,even though i hate itwhen i do that sort of thing

so anti-poeticsuch poems are

but...

first,let me be clear,being a skeptic of all things,it is not within me to worship anyone or anything, least of allpoliticians, worthy as some of them are,as they are more likely to be heart-breakersand, like the sweetest milkfrom the most contented cow,they all have an expiration dateand limited shelf life

that said,i do enjoy having a leaderwho is intelligent, someonewho does not believe the worldis run on frat-boy rules

one who does not surroundhimselfwith lunatics

one who looks to the future,not to the past

one who sees the problemsof the next half centuryand seeks to solve them beforethey overcome us

but who will take the most extreme actionswhen a foe makes it necessary,without lies and bluster

a leader, in short,who does not regularly insultmy intelligenceand moral standards

is it necessary that i love such a leader,no, but it makes me damn happywhen one appears in our time of need

Photo by Thomas Costales

Here are two poems by Alberto Rios, a poet new to me and maybe to "Here and Now" readers as well. The poems are from his book Teodoro Luna's Two Kisses, published in 1990 by W.W. Norton.

Ríos was born 1952 in Nogales, Arizona. He is author of nine books and chapbooks of poetry, three collections of short stories, and a memoir. He is a Regents' professor of English at Arizona State University in Tempe, Arizona. His work is regularly taught and translated, and has been adapted to dance to both classical and popular music.

Teodoro Luna's Two Kisses

Mr. Teodoro Luna in his later years had taken to kissingHis wifeNot so much with his lips as with his brow.This is not to say he put his foreheadAgainst her mouth -Rather, he would life his eyebrows, once, quickly:No so vigorously he might be confused with the villainFamous-in the theaters, but not so little as to be thoughtA slight movement, one of accident. This wayhe kissed herOften and quietly, across tables and through doorways,Sometimes in photographs, and so through the years themselves.This was his passion, that only she might see. The chanceHe might see some movement on her lipsToward laughter.

Teodoro Luna's Old Joke

-for Lupita

Teodoro Luna met a woman for whom he cared instantly,She loved him back.An together two weeks later they stepped into a marriageEighty-three miles long.It was their little joke, this calling of the years miles,And she would feign angerAt this man who through the years had earned the rightTo call them by any words,Her man with his one ear now because of war, her TeodoroWith his one armThe other worn away from milking the many lines of filled cowsand pumping the water.She could see how her man in his eyes the second white partsOf what he was becoming.First his hair, and his eyes, sometimes his flatfish tongue.She kept lookingHow he had begun to wither, the wisps of his brows, the whiteLines of saliva,The white arcs of his nails, his scars, his teeth and his legs,The foldings of his face.He was she saw making of himself in time the moth's cocoon,that he might break from it,A strong push and strong unfolding first of one new shoulder,Then the other.She would be there to the end, to the minute exactly, dressedIn the red dress ready,That he would be young enough again for the both of them,That he might lift her,The way he had lifted her the first time with his many eyes.

Photo by Thomas Costales

This is a series of poems I wrote over a period of three days following the death of a long-time patron and friend last year.

on the death of a patron and friend

a manin constantmotion

hardto think of him asstill

just like you and me

traveling southto bury a friendin a crypt beside the sea

like the restless, roiling waveshe came -and then he went

just like you and me

six white-haired men

six white-haired menstand around the pit

watch the boxas it is lowered into the hole

think of their friendand wonder

whose box is next

Photo by Thomas Costales

Now I have two poems by April Bernard, a poet whose work I've use often, from her book Psalms, published in 1993 by W.W. Norton.

Born in 1956 and raised in New England, Bernard graduated from Harvard University. She has worked as a senior editor at Vanity Fair, Premiere, and Manhattan, inc. In the early 1990s, she taught at Amherst College. In Fall 2003, she was Sidney Harman Writer-in-Residence at Baruch College. She currently teaches at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, New York. Her work appears frequently in top journals.

Psalm of the Sleeping

It is not only that the waves roll inas they do, roll in

It is what they bring with them, foaming in the waist-deep wash:George, and Joan, and someone named Sophia, a party on a raft -

Was it their house set to sea in the flood?

Here catastrophes of grey, high ceiling of grey, the sky flying awayon great wings of grey, receding

As still the low, muffled mist of water trundles in

Once there was a woman who just kept walking, head down,though she lifted it long enough to tilt Minoan eyesand we moved, suddenly, as if to follow

Where the moving speck of her figure slid behind the wallwhere sand and water and air join to one straight grey rope

Someone kept rattling the shark's teeth and jingle shells,tossing them in a circle drawn on the sand,to read our wretched fortunes

How warm the salt waves, how warm the bathfilling the nostrils, delicately greeting the ears, the mouth,the lungs and stomach, bathing the liver, the bones,in a finer blood than blood

Psalm of the Disarranged

Low at the ground, swiping the machete, thenthe match, the low yellow water of fire eddyingthrough grey stalks, hissing white, then the stalks go black

They said it was right only in supplicationbut they were mistaken: white smoke gathersaround my waist like a scarf; blue fire edges shin and kneesVoluptuaries of the burning lie in the field and smolder, wicks

Prefer the cool shadow of acacia through clouded glass,the cool and haughty toss of green leaves before the storm?The relief of a cool hand: hold it smooth to my throat;we are wondering at the silver light in which we shimmer

Fact is, we do not knowWe do not know the fire that might as well be water -It does not rid the plain of formsbut fills it, everywhere, with tall, tall trees of fire

Photo by Thomas Costales

Having dipped my toe in politics earlier, I might go all the way in up to my neck, with the next poem, also written in 2009.

the NRA is ascared of me

been readingthe NRA peopleare scared that i’m gonnatake awaytheir pistols and their hunting riflesand their AK47’sand their machine gunsand their grenade launchersand their anti-tank minesand their bunker buster missilesand whatever, if it makesa bang they want it -makes their dicks grow,you know, and they’re surei’m going to take it all awayand leave them alone with theirinadequacies,and i would of course, if i could,but i can’t, and the the lily-liveried,chicken-gizzard politicians in Washingtonsure as hell aren't going to risk their weeklypay-offs by doing it, so that’s the way it is,at some point, you or me or both of usare going to be blown away by someNRA card-carrying pencil-dick wackowith mother issues and a NRA certifiedshoot-all-the-motherfuckers-with-one-trigger-pull50 caliber machine gun

all because his mother dressed himin little girlie-panties and didn’t quit breast-feedinghim until he was twenty-six years old

Photo by Thomas Costales

Next I have five poems, one each by the five poets featured in the book Sirens: Five Femme Fatale Poets. The book was published in 2008 by Sisyphus Press.

The first of the five is Debbie Kirk.

Kirk has been publishing in the small press for ten years, including four chapbooks. She Pink Anarckitty Press which has published three collections, including one of her own.

I knew my mother was still conscious.But she had stopped crying and screaming.

Truth is, she stopped crying and screaming years ago.And I was only 5, but as I watched thisI remember so vividly wanting to kill my father.

I had my first homicidal urge at age 5.

That particular day is long long gone.Everyone's all healed up nicely on the outside.My dad's a fucking lawyer somewhere.

Back in the days of my early childhood II had a gun heldagainst my headbymy father so mny times that I lost count."You do so and so, or your baby girl dies."Every time it happened I thought..."This is going to be theday whenshe's just gonna say,"go ahead and do it..."

No apples, no bells...Just the huge presence of my dad, squashing the spirit of mymother and meinto the sizes ofthe bullet in a gun.

Again, those days are long gone now.And I know a lot of things now that I could not have knownthen.

My father raped my mother so many times that she convincedherself it wasno longerrape.I don't even have to spend two seconds thinking about it.I know I am a product of rape..I was created by evil, given a gun, and handed a torch .

So, you don't think I'm capable?Stay close.

The next of the five poets from the book is Iris Berry.

Called by one critic "A punk rock James Ellroy in fishnets," Berry is one of the true and original progenitors of the Los Angeles punk scene. In addition to writing her poetry, she toured with various rock groups, writing and singing her own songs, strutting around a Mexican wrestling ring in showgirl feathers, authoring the sex column Forbidden Fruit, starring in numerous independent films, and producing a series of burlesque and comedy variety shows with Margaret Cho.

She has been recognized by the City of Los Angeles for her writing and the volunteer work she has done producing large scale fund-raising events for various charities.

Ode to Sammy Glick

I see you sittingsitting in the glow of your computerburnt spoon and needleat one sideand a loaded gunat the other sidethere's only one bullet in the chamberand it's reserved for youyou're attempting to write the next great American noveland I believe you willproviding you don't kill yourselfbefore it's finishedIt's a raceIsn't it?your conscience and your egoare at a dead heatwhile your phone is ringing off the hookwith calls from your agentin London and New Yorkall wanting to buy movie rightsyou were the first guyto ever buy me diamondsI'm just wondering where the hell you got the moneywas it an insurance scam?phony credit cards?or your usualselling phony stocksto old people for their life savingswell all I can say isit's only a matter of time for you sweetheart]but if it's true that nice guys and galsfinish lastthan you can bet I'll be sittingIn the last seatIn the last row of the housethat I more than likely boughtat 100% mark-uptrapped between a noisy bathroomand a rank alleywaybut at least while i'm sitting on the lap of timechecking my watchI know you'll be mixing another shotof liquid comfortwhile running from thatgod awful mirrorcalled your consciencethere aren't enough opiatesIn the city of LAto make that reflection go awaybut I know youyou're not a quitteryou'll die trying.

Next from the book is poet Cynthia Ruth Lewis.

Quoting Lewis, "Cynthia Ruth Lewis is 42 and hails from Chicago. She finds great comfort in her bitterness and rage and doesn't hesitate to let it all out on paper. She does have a soft side, however and unfailingly rubs lotion on it several times daily to balance things out.

Each poet includes a self-portrait at the beginning of their section in the book. For Lewis, it is a nude. While very nice in this instance, I'm hoping it does not become a new trend in poetry publishing or I'll never succeed in selling another book.

The book also includes a section of full-color art by several of the poets, a marriage of image and word that was a central idea to my first book which included art by Vincent Martinez along with my poems on every page. (I'm considering re-publishing that book, Seven Beats a Second as an Ebook sometime in the next year or so. Already have other ones in process that will come first.

The Makings of a Serial Killer

I read somewhere that the majorityof cold-blooded killers tend to comefrom dysfunctional families,the ignored or beaten ones, the quiet,friendless kids who end up being thejoke of the neighborhood, awkwardchildren who never fit in - they growup with all that rage buried inside ofthem. just waiting to be released,looking for an outlet.

I'm not trying to fall back on anyexcuses here, but a psychiatrist onceventured a guess where all my suddenviolent fits of anger might possiblystem from...I can't remember much of my childhood.I obviously blocked a lot of stuff out,but it must have been pretty bad towarrant fury like mine...

all I know is this switch inside my headthat gets flipped where all of a suddenwhite-hot rage engulfs me, uncontrollablefury surges,rising up from nowhere likea hot flash, consuming me to the pointwhere the only thing I can mentally graspis destruction and blood-red murder

but what scares me most is not the fearthat I might take a life;the joy, the anonymity of slicing flesh,stopping a heart, erasing a body fromthe face of the earth, but the fear of eventually being caught an discovered,my reign of mayhem finally being corralledinto a cubicle of maximum security, wherethe echoes of other madmen would ricochetoff my brain, sparking the hot wires in myhead to a dangerous flame, and all I wouldhave to absorb the brunt of my red-hotanger would be a pillow to shred, anotepad of insufficient pages, and a penciltoo dull to embody the clarity of my darkan intricate thoughts

on the other hand,if I was never caught...

Well, that was fun. Now that we've checked the locks on the front and back doors and all the windows, the next of the five poets is Misti Rainwater-Lites.

Rainwater-Lites won the Gates-Thomas Excellence in English Award from Southwest Texas State University (my Alma mater, among others, and the place where I published my first poems forty years ago). Her poems have been published intensively online an in print journals. She has published several chapbooks, a novel and other poetry collections. For a period of time, she published and edited a print poetry zine called Instant Pussy and is currently poetry editor of decomP, an online poetry zine.

First Time

i was22freshly discharged from the armyliving with my momin kerrville, texasi was burning upchainsmokinglistening to hole/nirvana/the sex pistolscarving astrology into fat colored candiesdying to be foundfuckedlove would be a bonus

with short hair i bleached myselfred lipstickand a short dress that showed offmy cleavage and long legsi walked into the local joke of a dance clubready to sacrifice myselfon any man's altar

and there he wasdrunk and lanky33 years oldrecently divorcedhe bought me a bunch of drinksand leered with jubilationas he watched me shake my asson the dance flooroh, yeah! he knew he had hitthe jackpot of sweet cuntthat night

back at his placewe drank some moreand shared a jointhe played his guitar for metold me he wanted to take meto his parents' ranch in hondothey had horse and a hot tuban idiot angel bellowedHALLEFUCKINLUJAH inside my giddy head

then we were on his futonmy hymen still very much intactall the beer, wine,tequila and weedid not numb the paini kept saying noover and over againhe apologizetold me he couldn't stopit felt too goosuddenly he was a too serious skullsuddenly he was satanand i was rosemaryand it was not a dreamit was really really real

but somewhere in the thrustingin the midst of the excruciating paini turned wildi said fuck iti said all the dirty wordsi'd been aching to say to a manany man at all

i took the painand turned into a partyhedonism 101i screamed FUCK ME!FUCK ME!FUCK MY PUSSY!and he did, he didthoroughly, thoroughlyit was the kama sutra come trueand i hated himand i loved himand i did not whimperand i did not hold backi was auditioningi thought if i was good enoughhe'd take me to hondo to heaven to happily ever after

as it turned outi got him for one more nighttook me a while to learna woman cannot fuck claw scream her wayinto a man's heartand fairy tales are inside jokeswritten by gay menwho are laughing their asses offin their graves

And the last poet from the book (which I will revisit often) is Jude Lynn.

Lynn, who for a while was living under bridges, writes one act plays, short stories, and poetry, though prose is her specialty. She publishes frequently online and in print and has three chapbooks out.

I guess I should have suggested to readers that they lock up the kids before I started this group of poems from Sirens.

Oh well, too late now.

All the World Wants Anal

get any guy drunk enoughshe saidand they'll let you stick'emin the behindwith cock, with celery stalk, with threethick fingers rings and allshe saidand they might hate you for itin the morningbut they'll hate themselveseven morenot enough to prevent themfrom ever letting it happen againoh, they'll let it happen againshe saidonce you loosen upback thereyou won't be able to stop themfrom inserting this or that andthey'll get damn creative about it tooshe saidlike the guy she knew in collegewho would insert M&Ms inside his assholeand let his doglick them outand i saidthat's cruela dog's digestive systemcannot handle chocolate!that she saidthat's the leastof that dog's problem

Photo by Thomas Costales

Still working in 2009. Seems to have been a good time for political poems. Here's another one.

last week

the lady saysthe CIA lied to herand people who claimintelligencesay they find that ideavery hard to believe

the Dungeon Keeper -Darth-Masterformer Vice-Presidentgoes on TV to complainthat the new guysare messing upall the good work he did

his former bosswiselycuts his brushand keeps his mouth shut

the bishopswant to boycott the president,suffering as he doesfrom the anti-Catholic viceof intelligenceand the anti-Christianarroganceof seeking to exercise it

a university in the greatwhite state of Arizonarefusesto honor that same presidentbecause he hasn’t pickedhis quota of cotton yet

in the great armed stateof Texastime runs outon the legislationthat would have allowedevery student at astate universityto come to school in the morning with gunin hand - validationof the foresight of thewriters of the TexasConstitution, whotrusting politiciansever lessthan we do now,restricted their opportunitiesfor mischiefto just 180 days every2 years

state employeeswho must make sense of the results of these biannualsessions think half the 180would be time enoughand even less would be better

such a week

now a weekend to preparefor another justlike it

Photo by Thomas Costales

My last poem from my library is by raulrsalinas (Autumn Sun), The poem is from his book Indio Trails - a Xicano Odyssey Though Indian Country, published by Wings Press in 2007.

Raúl Salinas (aka raúlrsalinas) was one of the early pioneers of contemporary Chicano and Chicana pinto poetry.

In trouble with drugs as a young man, he served 11 years of prison time from 1958 to 1972 at such tough institutions as Huntsville and Leavenworth. Prison ignited both his social outrage and his literary ambitions. The jazz he heard growing up in a neighborhood northeast of downtown San Antonio would inform his prison poems and writings. Taking from his experience, he, along with other notables, helped to make Chicano and Chicana poetry and prisoner rights an integral part of the agenda of the Chicano movement.

Born in 1934, Salinas died in 2008.

The poem I've selected is one of the more difficult to transcribe, but I think it represents the poet's fire and life's work better than anything else in the book.

Probably not remembered or even noticed by any but those like me of a certain age and place, the poem concerns some of the epic battles between the farm workers union and certain growers in South Texas.